Official Everybody Edits Forums

Anatoly

Guest

Languages are too hard

Topic questions is: Should there be a language, which all people speak, so there won't be anything like:

> Hallo, wie kommt man zum Hauptbahnhof? (en.: Hello, how to get to the main train station?)

> Sorry, what?

A good question - Nobody is able to speak unlimited languages, or this:

> Мы уничтожем тот район, и настанит новая ера! Ера где славятьса русский народ! (en.: We will destroy that city place, and there will be a new era! The time when russian will be respected.)

> Just two Russians are speaking, let's ignore them and spy someone else!

If you know 5 languages you are a pro

Source: In terms of living people, a candidate for the record holder is Ziad Fazah, who reportedly claims to speak around 60 languages

problem: How to let people speak one language, for example why not English?

hummerz5

Member

From: wait I'm not a secret mod huh

Joined: 2015-08-10

Posts: 5,852

Re: Languages are too hard

yeah I just do English and that's pretty rough.

Languages evolve. Sooner or later such one language will become many different languages anyway. It's just pointless imo.

Also, just saying, that Russian text of yours has 7 8 mistakes in it.

languages do indeed diversify, but the languages will split slower than your lifetime, so you can't argue that you'll fall behind on them...

unless we get longer lives or languages really speed up.

I took a class or two of Spanish. I certainly have forgotten a lot. And then, of course, I could only tell you about limited things in a train station, on a dinner table, or on a city street. Lol

---

thanks HG, HG, HG, HG! anatoly, zumza! zoey!

hummerz5

Member

From: wait I'm not a secret mod huh

Joined: 2015-08-10

Posts: 5,852

Re: Languages are too hard

yeah I just do English and that's pretty rough.

Languages evolve. Sooner or later such one language will become many different languages anyway. It's just pointless imo.

Also, just saying, that Russian text of yours has 7 8 mistakes in it.

languages do indeed diversify, but the languages will split slower than your lifetime, so you can't argue that you'll fall behind on them...

unless we get longer lives or languages really speed up.

I took a class or two of Spanish. I certainly have forgotten a lot. And then, of course, I could only tell you about limited things in a train station, on a dinner table, or on a city street. Lol

Colloquialisms are change in short periods of time which become accepted and used by a wide number quickly but may not become official for a while but nonetheless part of the language. Why do loads of words get added to the dictionary every year and why do some get removed?

You're right, they're changing. They aren't being completely replaced or declared defunct. Indeed, some words fade away. Many of the "loads of words [that are] added" are used similarly across multiple languages. Point being, the world isn't going to (naturally) switch from English to Spanish in a day, or in a lifetime. English syntax will not be dramatically changed, no matter how many random words you choose to add in your lifetime. Again, I'm just arguing that you can't say "these languages are useless to me to learn" solely due to the fact that they'll be outmoded. That's not how it works.

yeah I just do English and that's pretty rough.

Languages evolve. Sooner or later such one language will become many different languages anyway. It's just pointless imo.

Also, just saying, that Russian text of yours has 7 8 mistakes in it.

languages do indeed diversify, but the languages will split slower than your lifetime, so you can't argue that you'll fall behind on them...

unless we get longer lives or languages really speed up.

I took a class or two of Spanish. I certainly have forgotten a lot. And then, of course, I could only tell you about limited things in a train station, on a dinner table, or on a city street. Lol

Does it matter how fast they change though? I mean there's no point in setting up a single language for 1, or 2, or 3, or 100 generations as splitting is inevitable. Doing it over and over again only for them to split again? Well, I don't know. Maybe that's going to be much easier in the future with the rise of communication etc but idk. I'm not against this idea, I just think it's not worth it. Imagine how difficult it would be to convince the world to adopt a new global language every time.

Sorry, what idea do you think I think you're pushing, or what idea do you think I'm pushing? I imagine languages are liable to become one major one, or perhaps at least slow down, as you mentioned with global communication.

Of course, once there is one major one, it'd be the entire roller coaster

dunno, I'm not a linguistic major

---

thanks HG, HG, HG, HG! anatoly, zumza! zoey!